


NiGHTS: Journey into the Dream Within - Helen's Story

by ococopuffs



Series: Journey into the Dream Within [1]
Category: NiGHTS into Dreams, ナイツ 〜星降る夜の物語〜 | NiGHTS: Journey of Dreams (Video Game)
Genre: Gen, Implied/Referenced Brainwashing, JoD treated as a sequel instead of a soft reboot, NiD version of Ideya meanings used, NiGHTS written to lean into their origins more than seen in game, adapts some parts of the game but not all of them, all maren are siblings, alternate designs used for girania and reala, at least the firsts and seconds nobody cares about the thirds, contains passing references to NiD canon, dreams dreams is a real musical in universe, headcanons ahoy, liberties taken with backstories, liberties taken with established canon information, nightmaren eating nightopians is canon, no beta we die like reala apparently does offscreen in canon, non-canonical persona mask, owl hardly shows up, second levels can talk, the kids have more common sense than in canon, they/them pronouns used for both NiGHTS and Reala, variable on other marens
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-17
Updated: 2021-03-25
Packaged: 2021-03-26 07:06:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,375
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30102138
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ococopuffs/pseuds/ococopuffs
Summary: Let your dreams be your guide... (-JoD Tagline)Helen Cartwright is a perfectly ordinary 12-year-old girl living in the city of Bellbridge. A young violinist, Helen has been spending her days practicing and practicing for an upcoming yearly competition that falls on the same day as one of her mother’s appearances in a concert as a solo violinist.One night, she has a strange, strange dream. The strangest she has ever had. With fantastic places and horrible monsters and a jester that flies through the sky as easily as a fish swims through the sea.A rewrite of NiGHTS: Journey of Dreams, attempting to patch up plot holes, inconsistencies, and overall expand and improve the game’s original narrative.
Relationships: Helen Cartwright & William Taylor, NiGHTS & Reala (NiGHTS )
Series: Journey into the Dream Within [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2214999
Comments: 3
Kudos: 3





	1. Gate of Your Dream

**Author's Note:**

> Finally actually posting this after sitting on it for a while.
> 
> Anyway, this is my attempt at rewriting Journey of Dreams, which definitely suffered from rushed development. Some of the plot points and pacing really didn't work, so I took a stab at fixing them in my own way. First time actually posting a fic here, so there may be edits and added tags as time goes on. 
> 
> Updates on Thursdays.

The metronome ticked on at a mocking pace. The notes on the pages swam before her eyes, dancing like ants.

Helen rubbed at her eyes with the back of her hand, mindful of the end of her violin bow. Sight reading. No matter what she did, none of the melodies sounded right, and the notes felt like they were jumping around, never in the same place twice.

She carefully lowered her violin from her shoulder, looking to see if her mother had noticed. She hadn’t, it seemed, as she was busy working on practicing the piece she’d be performing as a solo tomorrow. She wasn’t stumbling over any of the complex melodies, not at all.

Helen glanced at her bright pink phone, sitting on the little white table in the gazebo that sat a short jog away from the house. No calls. Yet. Her friends said they’d call if they were free, but Emi had to make sure her little brother got home from football practice and Rachel had practice of her own to go to. She was a cellist, and her tutor often kept her late.

Helen set her violin down on the table and picked up her phone anyway. It was only a three-quarter violin, a smaller version of her mother’s full size, though not nearly as expensive. It was the spitting image of the larger instrument, though, save for more chips in the varnish from accidental fumbles and sliding shoulder rests.

Much like Helen and her mother, really, the young girl mused as she unlocked the screen to check her messages. Same blonde hair, though Helen wore it up and with hair clips, her mother wore it down but back away from her ears. But Helen wore a pink jacket where her mother wore a pale peach, and a more fashionable combo of a blue skirt and black capris with lace to match the lace of her socks and the white ruffles of her shirt, with pink shoes to match, her friend Emi insisted it was fashionable. Her mother wore long skirts with floral patterns, plain shirts, practical shoes, and her favorite simple, single pearl earrings. Helen had seldom ever seen her take them off.

Her mother’s concert was tomorrow, wasn’t it? The same day as the school competition. Why was there even a competition on the same day as a major concert in the same concert hall anyway?

Helen’s phone, finally, buzzed with a message. Both of her friends were free from their after school activities. She hurriedly stowed her violin and scooped up her purse.

“Goodbye, mum!” she called over her shoulder. 

She didn’t wait for her mother’s response. She’d be late if she didn’t hurry. The last thing she wanted to do was miss the chance to hang out with her friends.

It was a short trolley ride into town and then a quick detour for ice cream. Emi was dressed stylishly as ever - puffy hat matching her coat, black shirt, white and black skirt to tie the whole look together, complimenting her short black hair, only not monochrome because of her brown boots - and Rachel dressed as comfortable as ever - cream colored turtleneck sweater, khaki shorts, and dark brown boots, her red hair done up in a high bun.

Ice cream Fridays were what they did every week. It was tradition, at this point.

“I still can’t believe you two are stuck at that competition thing _all day_ tomorrow,” Emi commented, shaking her head. “That’s such a waste of a Saturday.”

“It’s a yearly competition,” Rachel reminded her gently. “We’d be there at least through lunch just for the whole orchestra portion. Then there’s ensembles in the side rooms and then they only use the main stage for solos everyone has to wait so... it takes a while.”

“Doesn’t your mum have a big concert right after the competition, Helen?”

Helen nodded. “She said that she might be able to make it to the solo portion since they still have a last rehearsal, but the concert is supposed to start an hour after the competition’s done, so...”

“She’s going to miss your solo this year too?”

“Mum listens to me practice all the time, it’s fine.”

Her friends didn’t look convinced. 

“It’s also completely mental that you only get lame school lunch!” Emi exclaimed. “I’m smuggling the two of you some _real_ food. Especially for you, Helen, you’ll be there all day!”

“My mum could drive you home with us,” Rachel offered.

Helen shook her head. “It’s fine. I want to see my mum play. Her concerts are always wonderful. She’s getting a really big solo in this one.”

“I’ll bring you something good,” Emi promised.

Helen nodded, gaze drifting from her friends to the window of a nearby music shop. She licked her ice cream, not really tasting it. There were CDs in the window alongside sheet music, both to classics that were of the kind of difficulty the judges liked to give out. Harder than was reasonably. Weird sharps and flats, non-standard notations. Which was fine in the full orchestra, but...

In solo? In an ensemble, like her quartet with Rachel? Not so much.

Last year they hadn’t gotten any medals. At all. Her solo had been... a four. Where the lowest score was usually a two, a three if someone really messed up.

And their quartet had gotten a three.

Helen sighed. She was never going to be as good as her mum, was she?

For a moment, she thought she saw her mother’s reflection in the glass of the store’s window.

And then its eyes turned red. The window cracked. Helen yelped, dropping her ice cream and falling back onto the sidewalk. Emi and Rachel were nowhere to be seen.

The glass shattered, a creature with fiery red eyes, a body made of smoke, and a maw filled with rows and rows of sharp teeth smashed its way through the store window and dove right at her. With a scream, Helen scrambled to her feet and ran as quickly as her legs would carry her, stumbling as the street itself was replaced with a yawning oil slick void that made her stomach roll just looking at it. She could feel the monster’s hot breath on her neck and she stumbled, not daring to look back. 

And then there was a light. White and blinding and warm. She ran for it, feeling the smoke monster’s breath vanishing. She closed her eyes against the light and kept running.

The ground beneath her feet vanished and she stared fouling. Her eyes shot open, but there was no void, nothing like that, instead it was like falling through the night sky, though a sky full of little glimmers of stardust. It wasn’t scary. The wind wasn’t whipping past her face, it was more like a gentle breeze. It was actually rather pleasant.

The fall didn’t last long, and soon Helen’s feet touched back down on solid ground on a grey brick path in a forest of pine trees. She looked around, confused. The path was lined with red bricks and the whole path led to a wrought iron gate and accompanying fence out in the distance. She glanced behind her.

There was nothing behind her except for a sheer drop into an ocean of deep, dark stormy clouds, deeper than any darkness she had ever seen before.

With a yelp, Helen turned and ran as fast as she could away from the apparent cliff. She only stopped to catch her breath once she was through the open gate. The world wasn’t crumbling away behind her, so wherever she was seemed safe enough. For the moment, at least. 

She looked around, not at all sure where she was. It was a little plaza around a fountain without any water in it, though it had statues of mermaids in it. There were other statues dotted around, the only two intact ones flanked the open gate, the rest were broken into pieces or just empty pedestals. The whole area seemed worn out and forgotten, though the path was free of moss or other invading plants and the fountain was only slightly mossy. It was lit by the warm glow of little iron street lamps, rather old looking ones, the glow in them bright as a light bulb but flickering like a real flame. The forest outside of it had been bright enough to see in perfectly, but the glow was cozy and comforting.

There were also benches dotted about. Slightly worn looking red wooden ones that sat off the main path encircling the plaza, settled on little islands of red brick. The path that formed the plaza dead ended at the back at a set of grand stairs that were broken, leaving a gap between where they started to some kind of grand platform beyond.

Most curious about the whole place were the odd stone arches, each up a set of three short stone steps. There were three of them total that were intact. There were other arches littered about, but only steps to go with three of them, the ones mirroring those right at the edge of the plaza, the intact ones. They made a little ring of six around the edge all together.

And there was absolutely no one there. Helen looked up. It was a cloudy night sky above, but there was more than enough light to see by despite there not being so much as a moon.

She looked around. No, no sign of anyone. Well... she didn’t want to go _into_ the forest. There might have been enough light to see by, but it was still darker out there, no lights at all. She’d take a seat and wait for someone to come by. Surely someone must be stopping by to keep the little pathway clear of leaves and such.

So she walked over to one of the benches and sat down and waited.

And waited.

And nobody came. 

She sighed, propping her elbows on her knees and her face in her hands. This was awfully boring. How had she gotten here anyway? She’d have to find a way home at some point. The competition was tomorrow.

Suddenly, there was the sound of a flute in the distance. Helen jumped to her feet. That meant there was someone there! They could tell her where she was and how to get home. She dashed toward the source of the sound and stopped.

The sound was coming from somewhere off in the forest, away from the light of the lamps, out of sight of the little plaza. Helen swallowed thickly, staring into the relative darkness. It was still more than bright enough to see, but there were so many towering trees, and anything could be out there.

...But there was no one else here.

Cautiously, Helen left the plaza, heading into the forest.

The sound of the flute was light and airy, warm and playful. The notes to the wholly unfamiliar song flitted and fluttered like a bird on the wind, soaring higher and higher. Whoever was playing was remarkably talented to play such notes so quickly and precisely and yet so warmly. They had to be as good as the lead flutist of the Bellbridge Symphony Orchestra. Maybe even better. 

It didn’t take her too long to find the source, a lone figure seated atop a fallen tree. Helen hid behind a tree, peering around it cautiously

Whoever was playing the flute... wasn’t human. They had no wrists, no neck, no nose. They had one foot - clad in a boot of carnation pink with a stripe of dandelion yellow above the toes but ending in violet - kicked up over the other and were holding their pale hands to their mouth as if they were playing an invisible flute.

They were so very _strange_. They wore a jester cap with two little tails in two shades of violet, lighter with three darker stripes. They wore a similarly colored leotard of sorts with a vest of carnation and carmine with a bit of a frill to the collar, decorated with little yellow stars and two blue little gems at the sides of the collar. Their sleeves were big and white and soft-looking with intricate designs stitched down the side of the arm and cuffs in dandelion and violet patterned in triangles.

And there was a big red diamond-like gem on their chest, the reddest red she’d ever seen, that seemed to glow faintly.

The jester-thing opened an eye - big and vibrant, a strikingly bright mix of violet and hydrangea blue - and Helen ducked behind the tree, clamping a hand over her mouth. Had it seen her? What _was_ it? It wasn’t human. 

The sound of the flute stopped. Helen held her breath. She hoped whatever it was hadn’t seen her, otherwise she was...

“Boo!”

Helen screamed, scrambling away from the sudden unknown voice.

There was a sudden mirthful burst of laughter from right by where she had been. She looked up and it was the odd jester, doubled over in a fit of laughter in midair, floating without any sort of aid, not even so much as a wire rig.

“Y-You should have s-seen the look on your face!” the jester wheezed out between laughs. “Priceless!”

Helen stared at them. They... weren’t mad that she’d been watching? And they... no, they definitely weren’t scary. Very odd, with no neck or wrists and such an oddly round head, but not scary.

“Y-You shouldn’t do that!” Helen managed to yelp. “That’s so... so _mean_!”

“Yes, but it _is_ hilarious! The look on your face!” The jester giggled. “Besides, it’s _fun_. What’s wrong with a little scare now and then?”

The jester stared at her for a moment, righting themselves in the air.

“Come on, up you get.”

They offered a hand and Helen took it, finding herself quickly hauled to her feet.

“There we are,” the jester said. “Now... hm.”

They tilted their head a bit to one side, squinting for a moment before their eyes widened, a grin spreading across their odd features.

“A new Visitor!” the jester exclaimed. “Welcome! Welcome to the Dream Gate.” 

They bowed, one hand over the gem at their chest.

“It’s nice to meet you,” they said, their voice was just lightly edged with a Bellbridge accent. “Allow me to introduce myself. My name is NiGHTS. And you are?”

“Um... I’m Helen.”

NiGHTS? What an odd name. Wait... Dream... Gate?

“It’s been _ages_ since we’ve had a Visitor here! Two in one night, in fact. That’s _really_ rare. Come on, let’s get back to the plaza. It’s _much_ nicer there.”

Helen found herself steered back the way she had come by the shoulders, albeit gently. And soon the pair was back in the plaza, Helen looking around, a thought starting to form in her head.

“You said the Dream Gate?” she said.

“That I did. Why?”

“That means... this is a dream?”

“That it is! For you, at least. You humans call this place the ‘World of Dreams,’” NiGHTS explained, sounding as if they’d said those words many times before. “Which is sort of true. We’re in the Night Dimension, though, and our world is just as real as yours is. You’re a Visitor here.”

“Night Dimension? Visitor?”

“See, beings like me.” The jester jabbed a thumb at themselves. “Are from the Night Dimension. It’s our home. But Dreamers like you.” They pointed at Helen. “Are able to visit us in your dreams. So, ergo, we call you Visitors.”

She _was_ dreaming, then! That explained why there was no one else around and why she was talking to a strange floating jester person without a nose. She was dreaming! This was going to be a very odd entry into her dream journal, that was for certain.

“Now, since you’re here... aha!” NiGHTS exclaimed. “I knew it! A door to Nightopia!”

“A... door to what?” Helen echoed.

“Over here!”

NiGHTS steered her toward one of the arches. It was filled in with a door now, a heavy looking brown wooden one. Above the door in stained glass was the image of a pair of blue and black and yellow fish - blue tangs, if she was remembering correctly - swimming past a swath of reddish coral.

“That wasn’t there before,” Helen said, staring at it.

“You probably just missed it,” NiGHTS assured her. “On the other side of that is a Nightopia, a part of the dream world created by _your_ heart. Well, a part of it. I’ll explain all about that later, it doesn’t matter right now. Come on, let’s go and see what it looks like! It’s going to be an _amazing_ dream, I’m sure of it!”

“No thank you. I’d rather stay here.”

“Stay _here_?!” NiGHTS exclaimed, their whole posture going dramatically startled. Like a surprised cat, really. “Why? This place is so _boring_.”

“There could be anything on the other side of that door. What if it’s not a good dream? Like... like the one I had before coming here. What if it’s a nightmare?”

“Oh, come now, where’s your sense of adventure? Besides, you’re with _me_ . I’m NiGHTS, I’m _unstoppable_. So come on.” They held out a hand, smiling. “You can trust me.”

Helen held out her own hand for a moment, hesitating. Anything could be on the other side of that door. But... it was just a dream... right?

So long as it wasn’t another nightmare. Maybe... going to take a look wasn’t going to be bad.

She put her hand in NiGHTS’ and the jester, smiling, whisked her through the door.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Anomalous update today instead of tomorrow to actually get this up, still get chapter 2 up tomorrow regardless.
> 
> I do plan on writing all of both Will and Helen's story, but Will's won't be posted until roughly half of the chapters have been completed, since I hate to leave a work on long update or have it turn into deadfic. 
> 
> This fandom really needs a little more love, so here I am, I guess. Any changes to tags or content warnings will be noted as chapters progress.


	2. Sweeping Seashore

There was, impossibly, on the other side of the door, not some kind of room or more of the forest, but something else entirely. It was as if Helen had stepped into another world.

Maybe she had. This _was_ a dream, after all.

It was bright and sunny, a far cry from the place she had just been. There was sand beneath her feet and coral all around her. In the distance she could see fields of seaweed, fountains shooting water high into the air. Statues dotted the landscape and there was a towering marble structure that looked like it spiraled impossibly high into the sky. In the distance, she could have sworn she saw the mossy mast of a sunken ship.

She gasped when a school of brightly colored tropical fish swam past her as if they were underwater, but that was _impossible_! You couldn’t breathe underwater, and you couldn’t have water underwater either, and those fountains certainly did. 

Helen looked up. Sunlight filtered through what seemed to be the surface of the water high, high above. But she didn’t feel wet at all, what should have been water felt like air.

Wait. She was _dreaming_.

Of course it all seemed impossible, she was just making it up. Dreams didn’t have to make sense. They almost never did. It was a breathtaking place, even though it made no sense at all.

“What is this place?” Helen asked. “It’s beautiful.”

“It’s a Nightopia,” NIGHTS replied. “ _Your_ Nightopia. Aqua Garden.”

“My... Nightopia? What’s that?” The name fit, though... it almost sounded familiar, now that they said it.

NiGHTS hummed contemplatively, crossing their arms and kicking one foot up over the other to float, seated in mind air.

“I suppose the easiest way to explain it,” they said, “is that it’s your own personal dream world. It’s a paradise made by _your_ heart. Though how it works is just so _boring_. So don’t worry about the how, just enjoy it. It’s pretty, though, isn’t it?” They nodded in approval. “You’ve got a lot of interesting dreams in that head of yours to make a place like this.”

“Thank... you?” Helen didn’t really get it. Maybe it had something to do with that door? “I’ve never had a dream like this before.”

“That you remember. You Visitors forget things that happen over here so easily. Though I can say that _I’ve_ never seen _you_ before. Though.” They rested their head on their hand, elbow propped up on their knee. “It’s been ages since I’ve run into another Visitor, and you’re the second one in one night. I wonder how you got through to the Dream Gate, but hardly anyone else has.”

They frowned for a moment before shaking their head.

“It doesn’t matter now, does it? You’re here _now_. Come on!” 

They sprang to their feet, still floating. 

“Let’s go explore!”

Helen nodded. Though... there was definitely something NiGHTS wasn’t saying.

Well, it was a dream, so she supposed it didn’t actually matter, even if the dream felt like it was real. The sand beneath her shoes felt just like real sand did. When she reached out to touch a nearby coral formation, it felt rough beneath her fingers like the real thing.

Even if it was strange, she _did_ really want to look around. This dream was so beautiful, there was simply no way she _couldn’t_ go explore it.

So she started walking at an easy-going, leisurely sort of pace. There was no reason to rush. Her alarm clock would wake her up if she slept in too late, so why not take the time to properly look at it? The dream - the Nightopia - really _was_ breathtaking. The coral formations grew like flowering bushes and trees but were even more colorful. The schools of fish that swam about in the air were the most vibrantly colored things she had ever seen, even brighter than the ones she’d seen while snorkeling when her family had gone to the tropics on vacation once. Before her father had... left.

There were bubbles of water suspended in the air that the fish sometimes swam through, sometimes around. Out of curiosity, she reached out a hand and touched one. Her hand only touch the surface, feeling like water but not getting her hand wet. Try as she might, she couldn’t actually put her hand inside of the bubble. How strange.

“So,” NiGHTS said casually, floating alongside her, “are you going to explore this whole place on foot, or do you want to do something a little more _fun_?”

“Fun?” Helen echoed. “What do you mean?”

“Flying, of course!”

“Flying?”

This was a dream, flying made sense, in its own way. Helen felt pretty solidly grounded, though, just like in real life.

“Yes, _flying_.”

“How?”

“Oh, it’s easy. I’ll do all the hard work, of course.”

NiGHTS held out a gloved hand, the stitching along the glove so tiny and fine that it couldn’t have been made by hand, so bright that it immediately caught Helen’s eye. It was so very, very fine. Maybe made by fairies, maybe by mice, but not a person, no one could create such small and perfect stitching. And the thread was so shiny it may have been made of silver. Helen stared at their hand for a moment before staring up at them.

“I don't understand.”

“It’s called Dualizing,” NiGHTS explained. “It’s pretty simple. See, _I_ can fly.” They gestured at their very much floating feet with their other hand. “Been doing it all my life, as a matter of fact, so I’m _pret-ty_ good at it. Dualizing lets us both be in the same place at once. So I can do all the hard work and _you_ just have to point me where you want to go. Simple, right? So, what do you say?”

That sounded strange, but dreams _were_ strange. Why not, at that point? Maybe it would be fun, not having to walk everywhere, getting a bird’s eye view of things for a little while.

Before she could reach out her own hand, there was a strange hoarse sort of a cawing and a crowing, not unlike a rooster’s crowing, but... wrong. 

And NiGHTS’ arms, in a blur of grotesque green, were snagged by a pair of wickedly sharp, yellowy-green talons.

A buffet of wind knocked Helen off her feet and she saw it.

A monster. It looked like a bird - or, more accurately, the parts of several birds all stuck together together to form something altogether unpleasant. It was big, bigger than Helen, bigger than NiGHTS. It had talons like a hawk and the neck of a flamingo, but its beak was long and wickedly sharp. Its eyes were big and red and beady, its wings were absolutely enormous with ragged edges that reminded her of a vulture, and its tail was like that of a peacock, though sickening colors instead of vibrant ones.

And its talons were wrapped solidly around NiGHTS arms.

Helen scrambled to her feet, turned tail, and _ran_. Ran as fast as she could. Away from the horrible bird monster, the horrible _thing_.

She didn’t stop running until she was well out of sight of the thing and out of breath, ducking behind a towering spire of rock covered in coral. She sank to the ground, trying to catch her breath. What _was_ that thing? It was so awful...

A nightmare. It must have been a nightmare. Because she was dreaming. She needed to wake up now. Before it came after her. Wake up, wake up...

There was a musical sound nearby. Curious and cautious.

Helen looked around.

There was that sound again, a few notes sung by an unfamiliar voice, one that was high and rather squeaky. No proper words, just ‘la.’

Catching her breath well enough, Helen cautiously sang the same few notes back.

Something let out a delighted and surprised noise. And then some several something emerged from behind a nearby coral formation.

They fluttered, and were little... fairies? They were so tiny, not even coming up to Helen’s knees. They had sort of cone-like heads with little yellow halos that their heads poked through. They all wore the same little outfits, big puffy white collars, long orange sleeves, and little blue clothes of some kind that reached their feet, and they were wearing little white shoes. They had pointy ears, bright rosy pink cheeks that looked painted on, and delicate pink fairy wings that were almost see through and reminded Helen of sugar candies.

“Oh! Hello,” Helen greeted. “Who are you?”

The little fairy people just sang more notes. They must not have been able to speak, Helen thought. Strange. No stranger than anything else she had come across so far, though.

“Are you hiding from the monster too?” she asked.

The fairies all nodded. They fluttered about and all sat around her. At least she wasn’t alone now, she thought. But...

But NiGHTS was. They’d been attacked by that bird monster. It... it shouldn’t matter, right? This was a dream. She’d just have to wake up and none of it would matter at all. But...

But was NiGHTS scared of that monster like she was? She’d left them behind. Should... should she go back? No, no this _was_ a dream. She didn’t want to go back and encounter that horrible nightmare bird again. But NiGHTS had said that the world of dreams was real. So...

...What was she supposed to do?

She looked at the little fairies.

“This place... is real, isn't it?” she asked.

The fairies all nodded. So... if it was- no, this was a _dream._ Her dream! But... she hadn’t met NiGHTS inside of _her_ dream. So were they...?

She stared at her shoes.

“...What should I do? If this is real, then NiGHTS... NiGHTS is in _real_ danger. They’re a little odd, but... they were nice to me. But I _can’t_ fight a monster.”

She rested her forehead on her knees.

“What am I _supposed_ to do?”

She pinched her arm. Nothing. Still asleep, still in the dream. She... couldn’t wake up? Why couldn’t she wake up?

The little fairies chimed and hummed among themselves for a moment.

One of them gently tapped Helen’s leg. She looked up. In the fairy’s little hands were a bunch of little blue things that looked like marbles. It was holding them out to her. Curious, she took one, holding it up to the light. It sparkled in a deep and beautiful blue like a gem, like a crystal.

“What is this?” she asked.

One of the fairies mimed throwing. She looked at the little blue orb, then back to the fairy. She shrugged and threw the marble sized thing as hard as she could.

In midair, the little marble went from its tiny size to the size of a football. It hit a coral formation and exploded in a show of sparkles with a magnificent ‘crack,’ not unlike the sound of a Christmas cracker.

“Oh!”

That was... she looked at the little fairy.

“Will these work on monsters?”

It nodded, holding up its hands just a little higher, standing on its tip-toes to do so. Helen took all the little marbles and tucked them into her pockets. The other fairies fluttered forward with even _more_ little marbles. By the time she had taken them all, her pockets were nearly overflowing with them.

“Thank you!” she exclaimed.

The fairies trilled and hummed in reply. She guessed that must be fairy for ‘you’re welcome.’

She got to her feet, brushing some sand off of her. If the little marbles worked on monsters, then she could go and free NiGHTS and then they could both run away.

Helen waved to the little fairies, who waved back, and started retracing her steps, following her footprints in the sand.

It did not take her too long to get back to where she had been, but something entirely new had appeared.

A cage. Golden and floating, anchored to the ground with a thick golden chain. The cage itself was some kind of sphere, looking like two interlocking sets of talons with some kind of strange shimming barrier in the spaces between the talons. 

Inside the cage was NiGHTS, holding something and not only looking upset, but outright shouting at the bird-thing that was perched on top of the cage, a giant golden key with a big green gem at one end of it held securely in one of its talons.

“If they’re so keen on this,” NiGHTS was shouting, voice sounding slightly warped, likely by that strange barrier the cage was made up of, “why don’t they just come here themselves?! A _Goodle_ , honestly. You’re nothing but oversized poultry. And a sorry excuse for a Third, too. This is just _insulting_. And _embarrassing_. If I’d have noticed you earlier, you’d be on someone’s dinner plate already.”

The bird grackled at them.

Helen snuck closer, ducking behind a chunk of coral that was closest to the metal base the chain of the cage was attached to.

“Don’t you dare start with that.” NiGHTS pointed a finger at the bird. “I’m _not_ having this argument. Why don’t you just go fly back to your _master_ already? And you can take this piece of _junk_ with you!”

They threw whatever they were holding at the cage. It bounced off and smacked them squarely in the face before clattering to the cage’s floor. The bird let out a squawking laugh as NiGHTS put a hand to their face. Helen suspected that may leave a bruise.

“Hey! Keep laughing and I’ll pluck out your tail feathers!”

The bird kept laughing in its strange, grackling way.

Helen pulled a marble from her pocket and took careful aim, throwing it as hard as she could.

It impacted squarely on the bird’s beak with a ‘bang,’ clearly knocking it senseless, at least for the moment.

“Helen!” NiGHTS exclaimed, floating up to the wall of the cage. “Up here! Hurry! Climb the chain while it’s stunned!”

Climb it? Well... she’d try.

Helen raced up to the cage, grabbing one of the links of the chain and hauling herself up with relative ease. The links of the chain were so big that it was easy to climb, far easier than climbing the knotted rope ladders they’d had at the playground when she’d been little.

When she reached just below the cage itself, she stopped. The barrier looked solid, even if it was see through.

“How do I get through?” she asked, staring at the shimmering barrier between her and the odd purple jester.

NiGHTS frowned for a moment. They tapped the gem on their chest twice.

Helen’s hands started glowing with a red light.

“Aha!” NiGHTS exclaimed. “I knew it! That red light should let you right in. Nightmare can be pretty resourceful, but there’s one thing they've never figure out how to stop.”

The light didn’t hurt, or even feel strange at all, so Helen stuck her hands through the gaps of the bottom of the cage and hoisted herself up and inside without too much trouble. She got to her feet, the barrier solid under her.

Laying on the floor of the cage was a golden mask with a blue feather sticking out of the front of it. Strange.

“Now,” NiGHTS announced, “It’s time to bust out of here. We’ll have to get the key, otherwise this will drag me right back.”

They tapped something on their upper arm. It was a golden metal band, a glowing green gem set on one side of it. It looked uncomfortably tight.

Helen nodded. NIGHTS held out a hand. Helen stared up at them.

“We need that red light of yours,” NiGHTS explained, pointing to Helen’s still glowing hands. “That light is from your Ideya. A _red_ Ideya. The rarest of all Ideya, even though there _are_ only five kinds of them.”

“Ideya?” 

“They’re a piece of your heart. Red is courage and it’s _very_ rare, but also _very_ strong. With that, we can break right out of here and grab the key before-”

The monster bird cawed and lifted off from the cage in flight.

“Before the Goodle wakes up,” NiGHTS finished lamely. “Come on, before it gets away!”

They held out their hand, closer this time. Confused, Helen reached out her own.

Their hands met.

There was a tugging sensation and a dazzling gleam of white light and the feeling of gravity vanishing.

And then she was _flying_. Speeding along, suspended in the air. No support, no wires, no wings, nothing. From the air, the Nightopia was somehow even more breathtaking.

Helen glanced over at her arm. It wasn’t hers, though. It was NiGHTS’.

 _[That’s what Dualizing does,]_ NiGHTS voice said, though it sounded like it was in her head. _[I had a dreamer call it ‘fusion’ once. Don’t worry about it too much, it’s only temporary. Come on, after that bird!]_

They sped onward, chasing after the green bird. They dashed past towering spires of rock, over fields of seaweed, through schools of fish that scattered out of their way only to school back together once they passed. 

They followed the bird, the ‘Goodle,’ all the way to the towering spiral of marble before they caught up with it. They grabbed the bird by its tail, snatching the key from its talons. Helen felt her body move on its own - or, rather, NiGHTS’ body, they must be taking control.

And then they _dashed_ spiraling around in a tight corkscrew, the bird went careening into the ground, turning into a green ball in as it went. The ball bounced for a bit, rolling uselessly for a moment once it ran out of momentum, and then vanished entirely in a cloud of green feathers.

Helen’s upper arm started to burn.

 _[No time to celebrate,]_ NiGHTS said. _[Come on!]_

They dashed back to the cage as quickly as they could. The second the key touched the cage, the entire cage fell apart.

The metal band around their arm popped right off, the burning sensation vanishing.

_[There we are. Well done, Helen!]_

“But I didn’t do anything,” Helen said, only to clap her hands over her mouth.

That wasn’t her voice. It was NiGHTS’.

_[You were flying the whole time, I just made sure we stayed up. And I handled the dashing. I’ve been told that’s a little dizzying at first.]_

“But...”

_[You helped. Don’t worry about it.]_

“Alright. But what _was_ that?”

_[A Nightmaren.]_

“A Nightmaren?”

 _[A Nightmaren.]_ They nodded. _[From the land of bad dreams, Nightmare. They’re always going around scaring Visitors, stealing their Ideya and running perfectly good Nightopias.]_

“Stealing? But you said that Ideya were pieces of my heart.”

_[They are. Losing them is very unpleasant. Without at least one, you can’t enter Nightopia at all. Lose them all and you might never dream again. Fortunately, only a First Level Nightmaren can take red Ideya since red Ideya are so powerful. So long as we don’t run into one, you don’t have to worry at all.]_

“How many are there?”

_[Five kinds of Ideya, only two First Levels. Ideya come in red, yellow, green, white, and blue. And they’re drawn to each other. I bet we can find one of your Ideya around here if we look hard enough.]_

“Huh? How? They weren’t... stolen?”

_[Oh, they probably were, but that’s the thing about Ideya. As long as you’ve still got one, and as long as you’re asleep, the other ones will keep trying to get back to you. Now, let’s take a look around. It can’t be that far aw-]_

The ground rumbled.

In the distance, there was a glowing green light. NiGHTS sighed.

_[Of course. A Second Level. I should have known.]_

“S-Second Level?”

_[The Goodle is a Third Level. Second Levels are bigger, smarter - meaner too. A little bit sturdier, but I’ve beaten plenty of them before. This will be a piece of cake, don’t worry.]_

Something emerged from the not too distant ocean. A grotesque creature. Giant teeth, a gaping maw. Armored scales down its sides, glowing solid green eyes, and a glowing green lantern dangling on a file length of what looked like solid metal on its head, like a big metal angler fish big enough to swallow them whole in a single gulp.

Helen was too frozen to scream.

_[Girania. I’ll handle this. Hold on tight!]_

NiGHTS dashed forward, easily evading the snapping jaws of the monster while Helen barely held back a scream. It was horrible, terrible.

NiGHTS made a dash for the glowing violet gem atop the thing’s head that Helen hadn’t noticed before. The fish-thing darted to the side, jaw gaping side. NiGHTS hurriedly pulled their legs out of the way in time, the monster’s jaw clamping shut with a sickening snap.

Helen screamed.

NiGHTS charged forward.

The dash hit home, hit the gem and the creature’s body exploded into a mess of brightly colored balloons. NiGHTS flew in circles, silvery-blue stardust trailing from their fingertips. Every time they formed a circle with the stardust, everything inside of the circle was sucked into the center.

The balloons caught in the stardust circles were scrunched down into a singular center point until they popped, the greater cluster of them growing closer and closer together.

NiGHTS suddenly dashed out of the balloons, just in time for the mass to reform into the horrible fish thing, though it was noticeably smaller this time.

With a roar, the Nightmaren turned and dove beneath the waves.

NIGHTS chased after it, legs morphing together into a tail when they dove under the water. Try as they did to catch up, the fish’s swimming kicked up too much sand to see and they were forced to stop.

When the sand settled, it was gone.

 _[Back to its lair, then,]_ NiGHTS observed, lips just barely drawing back into a scowl, though only for a moment. _[We’ll have to go and find it.]_

“W-W-Why?!” Helen cried. “That... that thing is _horrible_! It’s... it’s...”

_[Scary?]_

Helen nodded.

_[By design. Nightmaren are made to scare people. Girania’s tailor made for Visitors with ichthyophobia - fear of fish - or that are scared of things that live in the deep ocean. Which is an understandable fear, really. That’s an awful lot of teeth.]_

Helen whimpered.

_[I know how Nightmaren operate. If there’s a Second Level here, that means it’s guarding an Ideya. We have to find it and get that Ideya back.]_

“W-Why do we _have_ to! It’s... it’s...”

_[Scary? Horrible? I know, but missing pieces of your heart is worse. Trust me.]_

Helen was silent.

_[Come on, let’s go take a break back on dry land.]_

Helen could only nod and try not to cry.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First proper Thursday update! Chapter length is going to be a tad all over the place, but I might double update on weeks where one of the chapters is on the shorter side. 
> 
> Anyways, yep, slightly modified Girania, since the original design's a little odd for my taste. Besides, angler fish are freaky, perfect for a Nightmaren.
> 
> Next time, more Aqua Garden!
> 
> Edit note: Slight wording tweaks to both chapters 1 and 2, some typo fixes.


	3. Sweeping Seashore: Marine Escape

They were back at the door. It had taken a little while, NiGHTS had controlled the entire flight back, going a tad slow. Helen hadn’t said anything on the entire flight over, and neither had NiGHTS.

But they were back now. And, in a flash of light, Helen was standing on her own two feet again, separated from the jester they had ‘Dualized’ with.

“There,” NiGHTS said. “Nice and solid ground. Feeling alright?”

Helen took a deep breath and shook her head. That fish monster had been... scary. Horribly scary. The single scariest thing she had _ever_ seen. It had nearly eaten the both of them whole! She shivered at the thought. Those horrible teeth...

There were a few musical notes sung somewhere nearby, starling Helen out of her thoughts. She looked around and- oh! The little fairies from before! They fluttered over, singing and warbling happily, though she noticed some of them were edging away from NiGHTS.

The jester tilted their head to one side at this.

“You’ve met the Nightopians already?” they asked.

“Nightopians?”

“They’re the only things that live in Nightopia. Usually they hide when there are Nightmaren around, but since it looks like it was only the one Goodle, it looks like they’re out to play again. It’s all they do, really.”

“Really?”

“Really. They don’t do much.”

NiGHTS picked one of the little fairies up by the back of its puffy white collar. It squeaked and warbled in protest.

“They play around and keep Nightopias in one piece,” the jester said offhandedly. “But that’s all they really do. Sing and play games and go fishing and sit around all day. _Completely_ harmless.”

They hummed from a second, a hand to their non-existent chin in thought.

“Why don’t you go play a game with them?” NiGHTS suggested. “I don’t see an Alarm Egg anywhere around here, so you’ve got plenty of time.”

“A what?”

“Alarm Egg. Nightopias are a little different than normal dreams, so it takes something a little different to wake up. If you see one, just head back to the Dream Gate and come back and it'll completely lose track of you.”

They floated over to Helen, patting her back to shoo her toward the singing little fairies.

“Go and have fun,” they said. "I'll be back before you know it.”

One of the Nightopians fluttered up and took Helen’s hand, dragging her off away from the door.

The Nightopian still in NiGHTS' grip let out a shrill note, but all of its companions were already hurrying away as fast as they could.

Once Helen was well out of sight and earshot, NiGHTS opened up their mouth, appearing to unhinge their jaw and revealing a set of impossibly sharp teeth. They threw the entire Nightopian into their mouth like a human eating a potato chip. There was a definite crunching sound as they ate.

The jester licked their lips.

“Salted caramel,” they noted. “With taffy wings. No wonder Girania’s here.”

As if the Second Level was capable of resisting anything that tasted like saltwater taffy in any capacity. Some things never changed.

Now, while Helen was busy, they had a side trip to make. Just a quick check in, then they’d figure out where had that fish gotten off to.

* * *

NiGHTS, Helen thought, was a bit wrong about the Nightopians. Sure, they were very much still playing games, but that certainly was doing _something_.

The Nightopians had ushered her through a gap in some rocks, through a little tunnel, and into a sort of cavern, though it didn’t have a top, the ‘ceiling’ just open to the watery ‘sky’ above. It was a pretty big cavern, though, the walls lined with coral. In the very center was a sort of oddly blue geyser, and dotted around the cavern were small geysers with regular, clear water.

But instead of shooting out jets of water, occasionally one would burble out a floating bubble. Ones that looked identical to the one Helen had tried to stick her hand into before, but hadn’t been successful in doing so.

And in the center of the room, above the blue geyser, was a giant bubble, as blue as the pool beneath it.

She watched the Nightopians closely. One would push a bubble and it would go flying forward, usually careening in odd directions. Sometimes it would crash into another bubble and the two would combine into an even bigger bubble. Then a different Nightopian would take their turn. And then another.

Then, every few Nightopians, one would push a bubble into the big bubble in the center of the room. If the bubble got absorbed into the big bubble, all the Nightopians clapped. If a _really_ big bubble got absorbed into the giant one, it changed colors slightly, going a little bit more purple, or a lighter blue.

When _that_ happened, all the Nightopians cheered and applauded loudly.

As far as Helen could tell, the point of the game other than trying to get a big bubble into the biggest bubble to make it change colors. She couldn’t tell if there was a scoring system or not, but she guessed whoever got it to change colors the most times won, if anyone won at all.

After a fair few Nightopians went, one fluttered over to her, gesturing at the bubbles.

“You... want me to take a turn?” she asked.

The Nightopian nodded. Several others cheered in their musical way. They didn’t talk, but it was still easy to tell that yes, they _did_ want her to play too.

Try as she might, Helen found the bubbles near impossible to direct. They flew in seemingly random directions, veering wildly to one side or the other. How did the Nightopians manage it?

The one time she _did_ manage to direct a bubble into the biggest one, the Nightopians cheered overly enthusiastically. They were just trying to be nice, she could tell, it was almost painfully obvious. It was a nice gesture all the same, though, it really was.

“I don’t think I’m very good at this,” she said to one of the nearby Nightopians. “Thank you for letting me try.”

The Nightopian fluttered up so it could pat her on the shoulder.

One of the Nightopians gave a warning shriek, startling all of the others. Helen turned to the source of the sound and froze.

Monsters. Not entirely unlike the bird-thing NiGHTS had called a ‘Goodle.’ There was a small cluster of them. A green and pink monster that resembled a seahorse but was bigger than Helen was. A pink fish monster with multicolored fins that almost looked like butterfly wings. Something resembling an eel, pink and purple with an unsettlingly giant grin across its entire face, its body sparking with visible electricity.

Most of the Nightopians fled, screeching in alarm. A few hid behind Helen, warbling and trembling in fear. Helen felt herself rooted to the spot.

One of the eel-things slither-swam forward.

She screamed, stumbling back, fumbling for her pockets. Some of the blue marbles tumbled out in her scramble, rolling uselessly across the ground. She grabbed a handful and threw them wildly.

The resulting explosion was enough to send the eel monster flying, crashing into a wall.

The rest of the monsters stopped and looked at one another, as if they were reconsidering their current plan. One of the seahorses made a strange burbling sound, one of the fish let out a rather annoyed sounding 'blub.'

Helen yelped in alarm when an arm wrapped around her waist and she was hoisted into the air.

“It’s just me!” NiGHTS exclaimed. “Are you alright?”

Oh. NiGHTS was the one who was holding her in the air. They were at a safe height above all the monsters now, NiGHTS staring down the cluster of monsters with a glare.

“I’m... I’m fine. Are those... more Nightmaren?”

“Seapo, Eelon, and Party,” NiGHTS confirmed. “Third Levels. There may be more here than these. Girania must have called for reinforcements.”

There were easily a dozen Nightmaren all in one place, more seemed to be swimming in every so often.

“That’s... bad, right?”

“They’ll wreck this entire Nightopia if they’re out in any real numbers. And it looks like they are.”

“So w-what should we do?”

The pink fish Nightmaren seemed to be grouping up.

“How do you feel about Dualizing again to take them out?”

“I...”

She wasn’t sure. Fighting that giant fish had been bad enough, but there were even more of them, even if they weren’t quite _as_ scary as the fish had been...

The pink fish schooled together, wiggling their ribbon-like tails and butterfly-like wings.

And whipped up a giant tornado.

“Well. I’ve never seen them do _that_ before,” NiGHTS managed to say before the tornado careened toward them.

The force of the winds was intense. So intense that Helen was wretched right out of NiGHTS’ grasp. She screamed as the winds swept her up and out of the bubble filled cavern entirely, NiGHTS shouting something she couldn’t quite hear above the howling of the gale force winds.

The tornado carried her high above the ground. Helen squeezed her eyes shut.

After what felt like an entire eternity, the winds fizzled out, dropping Helen unceremoniously, and face first, into the sand. Slowly, she hauled herself to her feet, shook the sand from her clothes, brushed it from her face, and looked up.

Stone walls rose high above her on both sides, covered with coral and kelp and anemones that glowed in different colors, waving in a nonexistent current.

A trench. A deep ocean trench, though it was as well lit as the ‘surface’ had been. There were outcroppings of rock suspended in the air, little islands. The remnants of a pirate ship, somewhere farther along in the trench. In the distance, she could see something swimming around. Several somethings, all brightly colored and definitely not Nightopians.

NiGHTS was nowhere in sight.

What was she supposed to do _now_?

...

There was nowhere to go but forward, since there seemed to be no way to wake up. She'd pinched herself before and it hadn't worked. And she didn't know how to find an Alarm Egg, so there... really was no other option, was there.

Helen took a marble from her pocket and started walking.

There were gaps between the little floating islands of rock, but, when she tried to jump to one, Helen found that she could just much, much farther than she ever could in real life. Even though it didn't feel like she weighed any less, she jumped like gravity wasn't quite as strong as it was in the real world.

Knowing that, she jumped from rock to rock, steadily climbing upward just a little bit at a time.

More rocks, more jumping. The sunken ship grew closer and closer until she reached it. It had sunk quite a ways into the trench, but it’s mast sloped up quite steeply and led to a higher level of the abyss. Helen swallowed thickly, carefully making her way along the precariously angled bow of the ship toward the mast.

A seagull-like creature that could only be a Nightmaren was perched on the mast. It squawked at her, wings flapping.

Helen threw the marble she’d been holding at it. The resulting sparkling explosion sent it toppling off the mast. She hurried past it while it was out cold and climbed the mast, stooping low to it, hands grabbing onto the occasional ropes tied along its length for a better grip.

But she made it. Somehow, she’d made it. And now there were more floating islands, more jumping, more rocks. More swimming Nightmaren.

Helen rushed past each Nightmaren that she could, throwing the exploding blue marbles at the ones she couldn’t just run past.

Up and up she climbed, higher and higher.

If she didn’t think about it, soon she would be at the top. If she thought about it, she may start to panic.

She didn’t dare look down.

She was nearing the surface when a hoard of Nightmaren descended, squawking and gurgling and making all kinds of horrible noises. There were just so many of them, but she was so, so close. There were a bunch of rocks forming what was nearly a ramp up and out of the abyss. The surface was in sight.

Helen held her breath and threw a handful of exploding marbles.

The explosion was loud and dazzling and, hopefully, enough. Once it was finished, she _ran._

She passed mere inches from a crackling eel monster, too disoriented to lash out at her. She stumbled as she reached the rocks.

Electricity crackled behind her. Something hissed.

She scrambled up the ramp on her hands and knees, heart hammering in her chest. Up and up and up.

There was a gap between the end of the rocks and the surface.

The noises behind her grew louder.

Helen stumbled to her feet, tears welling in her eyes.

She jumped.

Her feet met warm sand and she _ran_.

Ran and ran until she was so out of breath that she had to stop, sinking to the ground as she tried to catch her breath.

No Nightmaren appeared. Nothing tried to attack her.

It was quiet.

She looked around. There was no sign of NiGHTS.

...Now what?

The door. If she could find the door, she could leave the Nightopia, especially if it was full of Nightmaren. She still had some blue marbles left, but she didn’t want to run out, and she didn’t know where the Nightopians had gone if she needed more. And NiGHTS could already be there for all she knew, waiting for her.

But where was the door?

With no idea of where she was, Helen picked a direction at random, got to her feet, and started walking.

Rather than finding the door, she soon came to an ocean. It was a vast, deep blue. So deep that, a ways out, blue turned to black.

There was a faint green glow in the deep darkness. Hadn’t NiGHTS said something about a green Ideya?

She felt... drawn forward. She couldn’t explain it. But the ocean was awfully dark...

“ _There_ you are!” said a voice. “I was starting to get worried.”

NiGHTS descended from the sky. Their gaze followed Helen’s. A small grin spread out across their face.

“There _you_ are,” they said, nearly purring out the words. 

“Is... is my Ideya down there?” Helen asked. “The light? Is it the light?”

“Well, it has to be down there, but that’s Girania’s light. But there’s _always_ a Second Level guarding any stolen Ideya. They used to use these things called Ideya Captures, but a few Blue Chips short them out.”

“Blue... Chips?”

“Those little crystals you’ve been throwing around.”

“Oh.”

What a weird name for the marbles that exploded into such pretty, though loud, showers of glitter. They looked like marbles, not food! Not like chips, not even crisps. How strange.

“So,” NiGHTS said, holding out a hand. “Are you ready?”

“To...?”

“Fight Girania and take back your Ideya.”

Helen hesitated.

“But it’s... that’s...”

“Scary?”

Helen nodded.

“I know, but you know what else? You’ll be with me! The _unstoppable_ NIGHTS!” They grinned, pointing a thumb at their chest with a flourish of pure bravado. “I’ve never met a Nightmaren that I couldn’t beat before. I won’t let Girania put so much of a finger on you. Well, fin. You get the point. I promise.”

Helen stared at their outstretched hand. Could she... really do this?

...She was dreaming, right? Even if this place _was_ real, in its own way. Could she really do it? Fight something so terrible? Something that scared her so much?

...

Hesitantly, she took NiGHTS’ hand.

And there was light.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Nightmaren names sure are weird, huh? I had to hunt a bit when writing this to even find some of these names. The JoD ones really aren't easy to track down on the net. Also, yeah, swiped some of the NiD thirds. They're nifty.
> 
> Next time, punching a fish, or something.


End file.
